GREAT CUSTOMER CARE EXPERIENCE OF INDIAN RAILWAYS
On 20th September,
2012 while on board Shatabdhi express (one of the most prestigious trains of
Indian Railways) from Delhi to Chandigarh I had a very pleasant surprise how
prompt the customer care services of Indian Railways (the largest net work in
the world with largest number of employees) are. When the breakfast was served (I and the
consultant travelling with me preferred
veg-south Indian), and as can be expected the vada was burnt and hard like a
rock and even the portion of Upma was like a one hard cake. The sambar was ice cold and there was no
salt in chatni. While I left the vada
not risking my teeth, the consultant called the pantry people and gave them a
dressing down and called for complaint book.
As usual they did a bit of dilly dallying in providing the complaint
book, in the mean time he sent an SMS to the customer care number of India
railways northern region.
What followed is very hard to
believe and very pleasant surprise.
First a thanks giving sms came within 1 minute, in the next 3 minutes a
Supervisor of the train has come running in apologizing for inconvenience
caused and proposing to replace the breakfast with hot one – we didn’t accept
his proposal with food not being tasty at all.
While the conversation was on a call came from customer care enquiring
from the traveler whether the problem was sorted out or not and the caller
spoke to the Train Supervisor and gave him a good dressing down and ordered him
to provide complaint book to us immediately.
After 10 minutes when he went to
the toilet, as always happens, there was no water coming out of the tap on top
of the wash basin but there was a pool water on the floor. He again sent a SMS and told me to see in
the direction of toilet to see what happens.
Within 2 minutes 2 cleaners along with TT descended on our coach and set
things right and TT personally came and said sir now you can use the toilet,
and for the next two hour of the journey an attendant was stationed outside the
toilet mopping the floor after every use by any passenger. Whatever happened is just like a scene
taken out of Shankar’s Anil kapoor starrer `Nayak’ (where CM for a day keeps
calling government officials on phone and either keep getting the things done
by them or dismissing them). Though it
sounded exaggeration while seeing the movie, it proved to be more than real
since the call went not from a CM but an ordinary traveler. I
must admit that even while staying in 5 star hotels I never seen a complaint
being attended so fast. Incidentally 4
months back I stayed in Park at Kolkata and in 7 hours I stayed in the hotel, I
had to complain 4 times and being fed up while checking out I put down all the
issues running into a full page and gave it to the duty manager and till date
there is no reply of any action taken by them. As I am working in a hospitality chain, I did not press the matter, least they may
feel that I am making it an issue since I am working for a rival group.
Having closely observed my father
working in Central Govt with great amount of dedication and starting my career
in a PSU, I was always opined that Govt and PSUs (whether it is any Government
office, police, and defense) work far better than the private sector (in which
there is so much of show-biz and less of content) They are more organized, procedure oriented,
methodical and meticulous, great record keepers and their retrievers. All these despite very poor infrastructure
facilities and incentives, and they can
do wonder if they wish to work. The
blame lies on us as neither we use the ways and means to make them work nor
have the patience to wait and given them reasonable time to do the work before
trying to bribe and get the things done fast thereby corrupting the system
ourselves. In the train yesterday
there were not less than 70 people in the coach no one has complained and even
when my co-traveller was talking things out with the TS, people were amused and
must be thinking the guy must be crazy to make a scene. They are unmindful that it is not only for him
(we did not accept the additional breakfast offered to us), few such complaints
going will instill discipline in the staff and the people who travel after that
will be benefitted and the contractor who was supposed to supply good and
hygienic food does not make a fool of us and make money at our cost. No one expect everyone to become an APARICHITAN (again a Shankar’s movie)
and throw the contractor who supplies bad food into a boiling oil container
(that is the punishment prescribed in Garudapurana for supplying bad food, as
per the movie), but atleast have the inclination to improve things by making
complaint when it is so easily done by sending a sms from your mobile.
Come to think of it how many
people know that there are such customer care numbers for all regions of Indian
Railways and how many of us use them? The number for North is 09717630982 and
South Central is 08121281212 (numbers for other regions can be found in the
website of Railways). So next time
you travel in a train and find anything not to be in order, instead of cribbing
or making it a just a point of discussion go ahead and complaint and see things
being attending at an amazing speed.
Enjoy your journey in the oldest,
trusted and most economical mode of transport.
s. prabhakar
21.9.2012
